


Farmer's Son

by bar2d2s



Category: The Flash (Comics)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Farm/Ranch, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-05-14
Updated: 2015-05-14
Packaged: 2018-03-30 14:05:15
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,235
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3939604
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/bar2d2s/pseuds/bar2d2s
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>I like country music and writing weird AU fanfic.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Farmer's Son

It had all started when his aunt Lisa had decided on a whim to fall head over heels in love with their hired help in the planting season. By the time the first batch of potatoes was ready for harvest, Roscoe and Lisa had eloped, and it was the beginning of summer break.

And as much as he’d have loved to stay and help, his mom got him for two whole weeks at the start of summer. She’d really gotten the raw deal in the divorce in terms of visitation rights, but she’d also gotten the freedom to move out to the city, like she’d always wanted. A seventeen year old could get up to a hell of a lot more mischief in the city than out in the country. And so, it was with a light heart and a heavy duffle bag that he climbed aboard the train to Keystone City.

“I’ll call you when I get to the station, dad! Try not to hire  _totally_ useless help this time around!” Axel yelled, before clamping his headphones over his ears. Len just snorted, the beginnings of a smile playing at the corners of his mouth.

Roscoe had been a putz, but he knew his way around a field. Strictly speaking, though, planting was an easier job than harvesting, and he was pushing fifty. With school let out for the summer and the college kids coming home, it wouldn’t be too hard to round up some able-bodied help.

In the end, he went through four farmhands before Owen puttered by in his pickup.

The kid was just passing through town on his way to the west coast, and needed a job and a place to stay. His last paying gig had been in construction, so Len showed him the guest room and set him on the vegetables he couldn’t fuck up; potatoes, carrots, snap beans, and broccoli. Owen wasn’t afraid of getting dirty, could easily haul loads in his truck, worked like it was all he was good at, got along with the barn cats, and possibly best of all, didn’t let his head get turned by the pretty church girls that Pastor Rory sent by every so often with casseroles and nosy questions. The two weeks without his son blurred by, and Len found himself too busy to be angry that Axel didn’t call nearly as much as he’d said he would.

When Len picked him up from the train station, Axel was dressed like a city brat and abuzz with stories of new friends he’d made. He eyed the sleeveless shirt and shorts and high-top sneakers his son was sporting, and sighed. Angie’d never liked living on a farm, had never understood the necessity of things like work boots and denim pants. In the end, all Axel was going to get with all that skin showing was a nasty sunburn.

Axel nattered on about  _Joey and Lashawn and Evan_  until they reached their property, and then he suddenly cut himself off. Len turned his head towards where he was looking, and spotted Owen. He’d tasked the boy with digging out a stump that had been the bane of his property for years, and he’d already gotten to the pulling stage. He’d abandoned his shirt on the handle of the shovel, and his muscles were shaking with the effort he was putting in. A final almighty yank had him sprawled on his back in the grass, stump fully uprooted. Finally noticing them, Owen stood and waved, brushing dirt off his sweat-slicked, freckled skin, and Len felt a sense of doom settle over him like fog after a thunderstorm.

Well, shit.

Owen, showered and no longer shirtless, got to know Axel better over dinner. He was surprised to find that Len’s teenage son did the majority of the cooking, but Axel merely grinned.

“Dad’s not good with temperatures.”

“A man leaves the inside of a turkey frozen  _one time_  and he’s banned from the kitchen for life.”

It was an old, playful argument, from the sounds of it, so Owen let it die. In retrospect, he probably shouldn’t have, because that’s when Axel started grilling him.

He was twenty years old, born in Gotham City on the east coast, and on his way to finally meet his dad, who lived on the west coast. He had two brothers from his mom’s second marriage, his step-dad was a cop, and his mom was a social worker. He could play the guitar, was allergic to shellfish, and liked to bake.

Len could see the stars in Axel’s eyes from a mile away, and sighed. Well, at least the harvesting was about done, and Owen would be moving on soon.

He didn’t move on.

As it turned out, Owen  _liked_  working on a farm. It was hard work, but it left him feeling like he’d accomplished something. After the third month, when school started back up, Axel started getting used to having Owen pick him up. On the weekends, he’d bring out iced tea while Owen worked on his truck, and the older man would teach him the difference between a radiator and a carburetor.

Owen turned twenty-one, and Len took him to a bar for his first legal beer. They made idle small-talk about sports, and Len pointed out a young lady that was trying to catch his eye. Owen just shrugged.

“Truth be told, sir, I’m sort of interested in someone.”

Len simply nodded, though he could practically feel the bottom drop out of his stomach.

Axel turned eighteen in April, and graduated a few months later. Angie made the trip up from the city, as did a friend Axel had kept in touch with named Joey, to see him walk across the high school auditorium’s small stage. Pastor Rory threw a party for the graduating class and their families, and for the first time in years, Len and his ex-wife found that they had more to talk about than alimony.

“He’s set to break a heart tonight, our boy.” Angie commented, nodding her head towards where Axel and his city friend were talking. Len looked at them, then at her, then back.

“You’re kidding. Were  _they_..?” He stopped, deciding he didn’t really want to know, and Angie laughed.

“Mm, it’s more of a one-sided thing, looks like. It was a crush at first, I think, but they kept in touch, and Joey got real gone on him over his winter visit. Between you and me, I like the kid you hired better.”

Axel said something, and they winced as his larger friend’s face fell. As Joey left the party, Axel rubbed his forehead, but didn’t go after him. Instead, he approached his parents.

“I think I wanna go home. Been a long day, y'know? And I still gotta pack for when we go to Keystone tomorrow, mom.”

They dropped Angie off at her motel, then drove home in near-silence. Len cleared his throat.

“I’m not…I’ve been a good father to you, haven’t I? You know that you can talk to me if you need to, right?” Axel looked at him, startled.

“What? Yeah! Of course. Dad.” He took a deep breath. “I think I’m gonna try community college, first. I wanna figure out what I’m good at before deciding on the direction the rest of my life is gonna go. Okay?” He and his father let out matching whooshes of air, then began to laugh.

“You’re a good kid, Axel. Living proof that I can do something right every now and then.” He was practically teary-eyed as they pulled up to the house. “Don’t stay up too late.”

Axel nodded, but his attention was soon drawn to the porch swing. It was relatively cool out for a June night, and Owen was sitting there wrapped in one of the knitted blankets from the living room that were older than time itself, reading a book. Two of the barn cats were curled up with him, but one stood and stretched in order to follow Len into the house.

Axel stayed on the porch, and Len wisely decided that he didn’t want to be there to pry.

“So, didja have fun?” Owen’s tone was light, conversational as he dog-eared a page of his book and set it down, grinning up at the younger man. He’d forgotten to shave for a few days, and his usual thatch of chin scruff had extended up his cheeks, almost to his hairline. It made him look rugged, and Axel found that he liked it.

“Sort of. My friend Joey is in love with me.” Scuffing the toe of his high-tops against the porch, Axel let out a sad sigh. “He didn’t really give me a chance to even…he figured he’d come here, and then I’d leave with him and mom tomorrow and never come back. Go to college in the city. Be his boyfriend. He didn’t even think to ask what  _I_  wanted, just assumed.”

“And what do you want?” Owen asked, voice quiet, but steady. It was a question he’d been meaning to ask for months now, but had never found a good time.

“I want to figure out what I’m good at, and then go to college to get better at it. I wanna make sure my dad eats right and maybe convince him to quit smoking. I wanna see the world, someday.” He’d kept his eyes fixed on a point just beyond Owen’s shoulder for most of his little speech, but for the important part, Axel looked up, into his face. “But most of all, I knew what I  _didn’t_  want, and that was to be with him. Because I, I’ve kinda liked someone else for a while. And I think, um, I’m pretty sure, that is, that he likes me too.” A lazy smile spread across Owen’s face, and he shrugged the blanket off his shoulders before standing up.

“That so?”

He’d never understood why nature had been so cruel as to give him his mom’s height. He’d topped out at 5'4", whereas Owen was just over six feet tall. But he suddenly found that it didn’t really matter, there in the half-brightness of his front porch, as it simply meant that he fit against Owen’s wide chest all the better, Owen’s chin resting on the top of his head.

“I’m leaving tomorrow, y'know.” He said softly. “Won’t be back for two weeks.”

“Then I guess we’ll make tonight count, won’t we?” Owen replied, directly into his ear. Before he could answer, Owen had bent down to press a light, tender kiss against his lips. Axel smiled into the kiss, starting a new one before the first had properly ended.

In the end, they did little more than kiss, eventually moving up to Axel’s room and packing his duffle before curling around each other under his covers. They talked some more, mostly about the upcoming harvest, music, and what Len was liable to do to him while Axel wasn’t there.

“He’s gonna make me earn you, I just know it.” Owen teased, squeezing his handful of Axel’s ass while the younger man nosed at his neck.

“Nah, you already paid your dues, waiting for me to stop being both jailbait  _and_  a high school student. I hear legal students are a fetish in some circles so uh, congrats on not being a freak.” Owen snorted, mumbling something that sounded a hell of a lot like a pet name before falling silent. “I’m really gonna miss you. Promise you’re not gonna suddenly take interest in the way Frankie Kane’s been shaking her ass at you all year while I’m gone?”

“Promise and swear. Get some sleep, Ax, you gotta stay awake on the train home. Never know what that lovesick buddy of yours might try and pull.” They kissed a few more times, before exhaustion finally overtook them.

To his credit, Len didn’t freak out over the position he found them in the next morning; Axel spooned against Owen’s front, doing his best imitation of a chainsaw. Instead, he shook Owen awake, gave him a pointed you’re-lucky-you’re-both-clothed,-boy glare, and tapped his watch, slipping out of the room before his son woke up.

Axel acted normally enough at breakfast, though while he stacked the dishwasher, he felt the need to remark that pumpkin season was coming up. “And really, dad, I’m pretty sure we’ll both drop dead if, for some reason, Owen isn’t around to make those pumpkin muffins again this year. Heck, I don’t think I want to live in a world without his pumpkin muffins.” The intent was clear:  _threaten, but do not maim the boyfriend_.

It was a bit of an awkward ride to the train station, with three Snarts and Owen crammed into the front of his pickup, and Joey sitting in the bed, but they made it on time. Joey pointedly looked away as Axel stretched up to plant a kiss on Owen’s cheek, hugging his father and promising to actually call, this time. Honest.

For a few moments, Len had the awful feeling that maybe, this was goodbye. His son would decide that city living suited him and, with no school he needed to return to, he would attend a city college and never come back. The feeling left soon enough. Axel would come back.

After all, Owen was here.


End file.
